Raid 0 Performance?

Col_Loki

Hey, am having problems performance wise with my 2 x 160gb Samsungs. They are set up in a Raid 0 array (stripped set) with Win XP installed using onboard Raid.

I found the performance simular to the 120gb WD 8mb cache (mabye worse) , and this really shouldnt be the case. The drives are only 35% full.

I have done SiSandra File System benchmarks and am getting totally retarded scores....... ie.......... 16798kb/s , 18992kb/s, think the most i got was 20k. Ive been looking through reviews (the ones i read b4 buying the drives) and there gettin 35k with a single drive and 50k with 2 Raided.

http://www.modthebox.com/review227_1.shtml

I must say im sorta stumped, havent tried very hard to see whats wrong but i have to do something about it. Before i was just happy with the noise reduction but i need the extra performance as windows is annoyin me at the min (thing its gotten a little worse).

Any help much appreciated.

Nitrox

Hi
First of all have u updated drivers and BIOS?
Next, was the performance always like this or is it getting worse?
Whats your stripe size?

ChipZilla

Yeah, drivers would be the first thing to try. get them here:

http://www.abit.com.tw/page/uk/download/download_detail.php?pFILE_TYPE=Driver&pMAIN_TYPE=Motherboard&pTITLE_ON_SCREEN=NF7-S&pSOCKET_TYPE=Socket+A

Col_Loki

Yea i really should have thought of drivers.......... :rolleyes: , cheers!!

The performance seems to have gotten worse over the last while , possible messing round with the BIOS when i came back from the pub didnt help much. Ok sure i will try drivers and hope it does the trick, thanks.

[edit] Size showing 300gb ish, i know what you were thinkin Raid 1 yea? Id feel pretty stupid if i did that, was the first thing i checked.

jesus_thats_gre

Make sure you tell us how you got on. I am thinking of doing the same with two Raptors!

Dempsey

Originally posted by jesus_thats_gre
Make sure you tell us how you got on. I am thinking of doing the same with two Raptors!

Tell me how you get on cos im gonna do it in the summer:D

elexes

Originally posted by Dempsey
Tell me how you get on cos im gonna do it in the summer:D

ive already got mine setup with the raptors

im very happy
very very happy
ill find out scores for u later but when windows loads quicker then the time to open and shut the cd rom drive im very happy

weemcd

are raptors as loud as you would imagine with the high rpm?

Col_Loki

Yea i will tackle it 2moro or sat and let ye know how it works out. Raptors are supprisingly not that noisey (for 10k drives)....... the WD standard drives are much worse.

Dempsey

Originally posted by weemcd
are raptors as loud as you would imagine with the high rpm?

I have one raptor (36.6Gb) , I can hear it but it aint noisy. I read that the 74Gb version is even quiter because of Quieter FDB Motors and its also a bit faster too

jesus_thats_gre

Originally posted by Dempsey
Tell me how you get on cos im gonna do it in the summer:D

Shall do, should be buying this week

Originally posted by elexes
im very happy
very very happy
ill find out scores for u later but when windows loads quicker then the time to open and shut the cd rom drive im very happy

Happy days, thats the sorta performace I wanted?

Originally posted by COL_LOKI
Raptors are supprisingly not that noisey (for 10k drives)....... the WD standard drives are much worse.

What brand would you suggest getting?

Woden

sorry for hijackng but i've been concerned about my hdd performance for a while now

its a sata 160gb sea gate. did that file system benchmark in sisoftware adn its says i transfer 42mb/s

closed drives i could compare it too where two 120gb drives an ata and a s-ata both only did about 30mb/s so i presume this is good yes?

i'd also like to do a raid setup at some stage

data

Col_Loki

Good god if your gettin 42, thats a very good result. I really gotta get mine sorted out!! Last time i did it i think i was gettin 16-20 which is retarded (think it degraded as it was nice at first).........ok am tackling this 2nite.

What brand would you suggest getting?

If your looking for very high performance SATA drives then the Western Digital Raptors are the way to go......... there flyers.
For more "standard" drives you gotta make a choice, between performance or silence..... or mabye in between.

neokenzo

I just ran the test on my RAID0 and got something like 66M/Bps.

Col_Loki

Based on you guys scores im going to revise my pc sticky. Thats very good performance and there still quiet drives. I dont think the Samsungs will get that good of a score although it shouldnt be too far off...........

Re-installing everything, newest BIOS & Drivers , making sure i set the cluster & stripe size correctly this time............. it could take a while but im in the middle of it now, will post back when finished.

Col_Loki

Ok just back up , Raid0 properly setup this time with newest drivers etc and im gettin............. wait for it........... 64mb/s . Thats made me pretty happy .

I re-installed XP (formatting the drive also) there about 2 weeks ago and must have set the cluster size wrong (bad thing to do when drinkin) :rolleyes: , this has a majour effect on HD performance ....... to think i went from 16mb/s to 64mb/s, windows is flyin again.

Just for interest sake would people post what there gettin in SiSandra file system benchmark (2004). Its very easy to setup a raid array wrong (i like to tell myself that because i managed to do it ). Had it right at first , wrong at second lol how stupid.

Woden

interesting that both yourself loki and neo are obtaining similiar raid performance with two different manufacturers?

both quiet drives with decent performance, does the samsung perform better then the seagate in other areas?

jesus_thats_gre

.



Is it difficult to set up a Raid 0 array? What sort of process is involved?

El_MUERkO

73 mb/s from 2 80 gig drives running in Raid 0

Col_Loki

Well ill be dammed, tis nice to have very quiet hard drives (my WD drive is twice as loud as the 2 Samsungs) but i gotta get more performance. Which drives are you running El_MUERkO??

Would like to see some raptor results.......... :eek: , need a silent rig for the after the summer so mite swap a few parts and put the Samsungs into that, and mabye purchase a couple of raptors for my other rig.......... theres nothin to say it cant be a good performer rite?

both quiet drives with decent performance, does the samsung perform better then the seagate in other areas?

Ive a feelin the seagates are performing on par atleast with the samsungs, AFAIK they used to be quieter than they are now (Cuda IV & V) which leads me to believe they are getting better performance wise (theres another reason but im to sketchy to write it). Its hard to find a good harddrive rewiew which compares Raid performance aswell......... something im going to look into though.

Is it difficult to set up a Raid 0 array? What sort of process is involved?

Its very easy, you just need to follow a simple guide Here and you will be fine

jesus_thats_gre

Originally posted by COL_LOKI
Its very easy, you just need to follow a simple guide Here and you will be fine

Cheers

Bosco

Getting 70MB/s (as measured by Sandra 2004) using 2x80GB Maxtor 80GB SATA drives connected to an 875 based board running Server 2003. Stripe size 64K. Drive formated using default NTFS block size.

Does anyone know if performance would be hindered much (or at all) if I were to use 120gb drives?